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I don't like seeing him be so inconsistent either. I do not think he is getting a free pass though. It's a simple matter of Arrieta being the most likely to have a dominant game and most likely to be a true workhorse.

Old Sneakers wrote:I don't like seeing him be so inconsistent either. I do not think he is getting a free pass though. It's a simple matter of Arrieta being the most likely to have a dominant game and most likely to be a true workhorse.

Are you willing to offer an opinion on what the problem is? I'm beginning to think that he starts to doubt himself and tries to get too fine with his location. The result of that is normally what we've seen from him over the last few outings.

Old Sneakers wrote:I don't like seeing him be so inconsistent either. I do not think he is getting a free pass though. It's a simple matter of Arrieta being the most likely to have a dominant game and most likely to be a true workhorse.

Are you willing to offer an opinion on what the problem is? I'm beginning to think that he starts to doubt himself and tries to get too fine with his location. The result of that is normally what we've seen from him over the last few outings.

This is pretty much what I know about pitching as a whole and I absolutely believe it applies to every pitcher in the league including Arrieta...

The Fastball is the best pitch in baseball.A great fastball has late dive! (Even lower velocity pitchers that have great command and movement do very nicely!)A flat Fastall is trouble!A Fastball that cannot be located for strikes is pure trouble.

No matter how beautiful an offspeed pitch (curveball, slider, changeup or whatever) is far less effective if that fastball is not happening!

Arrieta is a guy whom has four good looking pitches, but it's all about command. When he's on he is everything you want! However start after start he doesn't always have what you are looking for. When he has command and goes after hitters he is everything you want. That isn't to say his pitches are unhittable, but he looks like the prototype pitcher every team wants. I expect what we've seen so far is what we will continue to see. He will have stretches where he is just solid in every way and we will all salivate at times at an E.R.A that dives. Then he will have bad outings and it will skyrocket. What's the answer here? Hell if I know.

I have no clue if he or the staff are tinkering with this or that. I like everyone else here can only speculate. I do seriously doubt that it's pressure or losing focus on what he's trying to accomplish. This is guy whom we've seen do very nicely against some rough lineups.

I was listening to Steve Melewski on Baltimore Baseball Tonight and a caller brought up Zach Britton and who would go down. Steve said if he was ready tomorrow that Hunter would go down. Hunter has the same amount of quality starts as Arrieta and has a better ERA. It just doesn't make any sense to me. I wish I wasn't at work or I would have called in and asked him about this topic.

Matt P wrote:I was listening to Steve Melewski on Baltimore Baseball Tonight and a caller brought up Zach Britton and who would go down. Steve said if he was ready tomorrow that Hunter would go down. Hunter has the same amount of quality starts as Arrieta and has a better ERA. It just doesn't make any sense to me. I wish I wasn't at work or I would have called in and asked him about this topic.

Old Sneakers wrote: I do seriously doubt that it's pressure or losing focus on what he's trying to accomplish. This is guy whom we've seen do very nicely against some rough lineups.

I had an excellent pitching coach that told me that the inability to throw strikes generally falls into four different categories:

an injurybad mechanicsinconsistent mechanicsself doubt

There is no reason to believe that Arrieta is injured. The elbow issue seems to be resolved and he hasn't shown any other injury symptoms. I can't see any basic flaws in his pitching mechanics and he seems to be pretty consistent with his delivery. That leaves self doubt which can show up in several different forms. The one I find most infuriating is what I call "nibbling". A pitcher gets two strikes and then becomes overly concerned about giving the batter too good a pitch with an o - 2 count. Three wasted pitches later they're looking at HAVING to throw a strike. Not only does this run up his pitching count, it returns the advantage to the hitter.

If a hitter was going to beat me I wanted it to be on a pitch I WANTED to throw, not one I HAD to throw. When I had the batter down 0 -2 or 1 -2 the batter had to worry about which speed I was going to use and which part of the plate I was going to locate to. With a good scouting report I had an idea where he was vulnerable, and if I had set him up with the first two pitches I could throw my pitch at a speed and location I wanted and, perhaps, the batter wasn't ready for.

Jake Arrieta has good stuff and is usually able to get two strikes on the first two or three pitches. I just wish he would trust that stuff to go after strike three without wasting a pitch or two. With his body he could become a complete game machine if he were to trim two or three pitches an inning.

He was more consistently aggressive with two strikes. The same thing with Kevin Gregg. Nine pitches tonight and seven were strikes. Over his last six appearances he has pretty much stopped nibbling and become aggressive when he has two strikes. It REALLY makes a difference.

Matt P wrote:I was listening to Steve Melewski on Baltimore Baseball Tonight and a caller brought up Zach Britton and who would go down. Steve said if he was ready tomorrow that Hunter would go down. Hunter has the same amount of quality starts as Arrieta and has a better ERA. It just doesn't make any sense to me. I wish I wasn't at work or I would have called in and asked him about this topic.